Tag: fcc

  • FCC: making a rulebook out of metaphors

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    Regulators and network operators across the world will be watching events unfold in Washington DC with some astonishment today, as the US telecoms industry becomes embroiled in a bureaucratic farce. Late last week, the US regulator the Federal Communications Commission issued a landmark assertion of authority over how American operators should manage their networks –…

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  • How Free Press breaks the citizens’ network

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    In 2003 the journalist Ron Suskind captured one of the quotes of the decade when he cited an unnamed Bush administration official as saying: “When we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality, we’ll act again, creating other new realities.” On the web today, “political activism” has become a virtual…

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  • We sneer at your global standards, and your economies of scale…

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    More dismal news for the US consumer. After the simultaneous failure of Municipal Wi-Fi projects in three major US cities – something we predicted four years ago – faster, cheaper mobile data looks further away than ever. So why are Google lobbyists advocating for the next wave of collapsing wireless initiatives – rather than helping…

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  • Smart radios are still pretty dumb

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    More than three years ago, your reporter got a good taste of how miserable technology utopians can be. It was at Intel’s Developer Forum in San Francisco, and the debate was about liberating analog TV spectrum for exciting new digital uses. The analog switchover is slated for February 2009. On behalf of Microsoft, Google, and…

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  • FCC opens door to ISP wipe-out

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    Re-monopolizing the phone service  US telecoms regulator the FCC has signaled the end of the independent ISP, a move which will leave DSL provision concentrated in the hands of just a few large providers. The move, which turns local DSL provision from a regulated monopoly into an unregulated monopoly, also has repercussions for rural telephony…

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